Michigan

Community honors Martin Luther King Jr.

Press Photo/Rex LarsenStudents in the Martin Luther King Jr. parade on Monday afternoon carried hand-colored portraits of the late civil rights leader. More photos

West Michigan paid its respects in large and small ways Monday to late civil rights leader the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr.

Press Photo/Katy BatdorffMinnijean Brown-Trickey, one of the Little Rock Nine, spoke at Grand Valley State University's Martin Luther King Jr. event on Monday.

A record crowd of about 2,000 turned out for Grand Rapids Community College's 22nd annual Community Peace March. About 1,200 took part in a silent march at Grand Valley State University's Allendale Township campus.

Another, lesser known, civil rights leader on Monday paid tribute to those who took the time to remember King, the progress since his death and the struggles ahead.

"I kept thinking while we were marching silently about the work of ordinary people," said Minnijean Brown-Trickey, who spoke at the GVSU event on Monday.

One of the Little Rock Nine, Brown-Trickey was one of the first black students in the country to walk through the doors of a white high school after the landmark 1954 Brown v. Board of Education Supreme Court decision ordering desegregation of public schools.

She was 16 when she entered Central High School in Little Rock, Ark., on Sept. 25, 1957. She did so after President Dwight D. Eisenhower ordered soldiers to protect the students after the Arkansas governor ordered the state's National Guard to keep the students out.

During remarks Monday afternoon, she offered a reminder that little things count. Even King had no clue that the small gestures he made, especially at the beginning of the civil rights movement, would some day change the world.

"I think that maybe you thought all we were doing was marching in the snow today. But, in fact, it is those small acts on the part of ordinary people that make a difference," Brown-Trickey said.

"Martin Luther King had no idea that the small acts in his own life would one day catapult him into an icon of social justice."

She said those looking for leadership with a conscience need look no further than the words King's left behind.

"We know that he was here because his words are here," she said. "Young people today say we don't have a leader, but yes we do because his words are still with us."

Eboni Brown, a 12-year-old sixth-grader at Newhall Middle School in Wyoming, stood in the cold outside GRCC looking at all the faces around her. Marching with classmates, she understood her presence mattered.

"This is important, so we remember what Martin Luther King did," she said.

"If he hadn't done what he did, we wouldn't be here all together like this."